


Green

by beehoony



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Awkward Romance, Eventual Romance, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Romantic Fluff, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-10
Updated: 2015-01-10
Packaged: 2018-03-06 23:04:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3151658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beehoony/pseuds/beehoony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Haven was permanently steeped in the strange green light of the Breach. It made her feel like she was swimming in one of the ornamental ponds in Trevelyan estate, water green and heavy with pondweed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Green

 

Haven was permanently steeped in the strange green light of the Breach. It made her feel like she was swimming in one of the ornamental ponds in Trevelyan estate, water green and heavy with pondweed. Fish stirred the water from time to time; greedy mouths opening and closing as she fed them bread crumbs from the table. She never understood why she did it; their gaping mouths and unblinking eyes repulsed her, but she was also fascinated to the point that she found it hard to look away.

He caught her looking at his arm guards, her face probably as stupid and blank as the fish. Polite as ever, he inquired, "Is there something you need?"

She decided against telling him that they were all fish swimming in a pond, and instead reached for his wrist tentatively, glancing at his face when she realised that she had never touched him and worrying that she was about to cross a line. His face was guarded, but she figured it was too late to turn back (take a big breath, don't cringe at how awkward you are). He made no move to stop her but he did not unfold his arms either. She took his wrist gingerly and gently turned it from side to side, showing him how the light of the Breach reflected off his armour. She hadn't noticed it when he was down at the training grounds, but here in front of the Chantry, his armour glowed as green as her mark did. "It's fascinating." She would almost say that it's beautiful, but for how it kept spitting out demons.

He smiled then, one of those gentle small ones that she hoped he saved for her. "I hadn't noticed that."

Unsurprisingly, that was the moment Chancellor Roderick reappeared. They pulled away from each other, him folding his arms again and she shoving her hands into her pockets.

"Well, if it isn't the self-declared Herald of Andraste and her templar again. Aren't you meant to be off to Val Royeaux by now?"

"All in good time, Chancellor. One must make a suitable impression, and the first step to doing that is to be fashionably late. The Chantry mothers are nothing if not patient." She thought the better out of it only once the words had left her mouth.

Roderick never took much goading. "How dare you disrespect--"

Cullen pointedly stepped in front of her and she peered around his fluffy shoulders at the Chancellor. "The Herald and I were speaking to each other. If we wished your opinion, we would have asked for it. Good day, Chancellor."

"I'm sure speaking is all you were doing," he said in a voice heavy with irony. "I see I'm not wanted, but I'm sure others have the time for me. Good day. You should find Val Royeaux most enlightening." The Chancellor stomped off when neither of them deigned to reply.

Cullen was flushed, and she wondered if it was with anger or something else altogether. "I apologise for the Chancellor's comments, Lady Trevelyan."

Oh. Annoyance it was. She was getting annoyed too, mainly because of how disappointed she felt (stop being silly, you have bigger problems).

"Why should you apologise? If anything, I should be the one doing so. I just made your job harder. He'll probably go off and try to incite some riots now."

He cleared his throat. "He would have done so anyway." She didn't notice him looking at her anxiously. She looked so glum, and he wasn't quite sure why that mattered to him. "Do not worry about Roderick; he is what he is. It's...um, the weather is really nice."

She looked up at the constant magical thunderstorm centred on the Breach and smiled a little at the absurdity. He felt the blush creeping further down his neck. How should he excuse himself before he embarrassed himself more? Polishing his armour? Troop movement reports? Calibrating trebuchets?

She reached up to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear, veins tracing delicate green patterns on her hands. So unlike the thick ropey ones on his own. "I don't know why the Breach and the rifts are so green. The Fade looks nothing like that to me. Not even in the Hinterlands, verdant as it is. It is very beautiful there, despite all the bears. Is Honnleath much the same?"

He hadn't thought about it for too long. He still answered when asked, yes, I am Fereldan, I grew up near Honnleath. Most people were happy to leave it at that, but she seemed genuinely curious.

"We had less bears than the Hinterlands does, judging by your reports."

"I wasn't exaggerating! Ask Varric if you wish." She wrinkled her nose adorably. "Were there any lakes or rivers near your village?"

"We were on the banks of one of the tributaries feeding Lake Calenhad. I loved swimming there in summer, but it was always cold. We used to submerge ourselves for as long as we could, and then lie in the sun on the docks to warm up." A little knot formed in his gut when he remembered the reckless abandon with which they had dove into the lake, frightening slippery eels that slithered away into the murk. He used to float on his back looking at the sun until all he could see was sunspots, and Mia would scold him when he pretended to be blind. It had been a simpler time.

"It sounds wonderful. But I can't see you swimming! I can't imagine you out of your armour." The image of a child laughing as he cannonballed into the cold depths did not match that of the commander. But they all had been young once.

He smirked a little. "It may be hard to believe, but I do sleep. And yes, before you ask, I do take my armour off." He wondered whether the question meant that she had actually tried to imagine him out of his armour, and why. Maker.

"I'll believe when I see it." From anyone else, it would have been flirting. From the Herald, it was merely a flippant joke. From anyone else, it would have made him think less of them. From her, he felt like there was a chance for...something, and it was slipping through his fingers as he stared at her dumbly. She was smiling mischievously, and he finally matched it with one of his own.

"Where is Honnleath? I was at best an indifferent student of geography and cartography." She rolled her eyes. "I didn't expect to be doing quite this much travelling, and certainly not in Ferelden and Orlais."

She said it lightly, but heavy between them was unspoken thought that she had expected to live in the Ostwick Circle for the rest of her life. She had told him that she was brought to the Circle before her sixth birthday (how ironic that she thought that he had been young when he joined the templars--he had spent twice the number of years outside the Circle that she had) . While he knew the Trevelyans ensured that she came home to them, much of the outside world must be new to her. As it was to him, in many ways.

"It will be easier for me to show you. After you, my lady." He held the door to the Chantry open for her. In the war room, he showed her on the map where Honnleath was, and his village.

As she placed a map marker on both and traced the surrounding major roads with a finger, she asked, "Did your home have a sod roof like the ones in the Hinterlands?" When he nodded, she grinned. "No wonder the Orlesians think you Fereldans quaint. I think it's a fantastic way to keep out the cold, but were there many spiders living in the sod?"

"Um. I do not believe so. If I may ask, is there any reason for asking this?"

"Why shouldn't I? As the Herald of Andraste, can I get us to declare a holy war on spiders?"

His curiosity was piqued. "As commander of the forces, I would support this motion, although I am interested as to why the Maker would set us on such a path."

"Because they're...spider demons? Any more detail than that is classified information, commander."

He could keep playing along. "If I'm going to commit my troops to the extermination of these eight-legged horrors, I need to know what you know."

She looked down, biting her lip to keep from laughing. "Before I joined the Circle, I was reading in bed one night when a spider as big as my face fell next to me on the pillow."

"This is worse than I expected. Was that the first attempt on your life, Herald?"

She couldn't stop the giggles. "Yes! Although, maybe it wasn't quite that big." She held her fingers apart by a fraction of an inch. "Maybe it was just this big. But it assaulted my safe haven. And I couldn't find it after I flung the pillow across the room. I suspect it has spied on me since."

"Fear not; as you are our only hope in sealing the Breach, we shall defend you valiantly and ensure you never fall into the creature's grasp."

The door opened and they both startled. He hadn't realised that they had not moved from where they had been, heads close as they examined the map together. Part of him sarcastically noted that it was not for lack of space at that large table, and the thought burned his cheeks.

"Herald! We have been looking for you. It is time to depart for Val Royeaux." Cassandra looked back and forth at both of them, eyebrows knitting quizzically.

She flexed the fingers on her marked hand and jumped off her perch on the war table. "I hope you have a speech prepared, Cassandra. My plan is to look innocent and politely ask them to stop hinting that executing me is the Maker's will."

Cassandra sighed. "At least you are good at looking blameless. We will have a few days to practice what to say, and Josephine has prepared some points for us."

"Farewell, commander. Have fun putting out fires."

"Herald--Lady Trevelyan. Be careful."

She lingered at the door after Cassandra passed through. "I would say I always am, but that's a lie. I--take care, Cullen." With a final enigmatic smile, she closed the door and he let out the breath that he hadn't realised he had been holding.

****

He kept seeing green everywhere after that. Reflecting off his men's helmets. Flashing off his arm guards. Glinting off the sword Harritt was polishing. It all reminded him of her now, and that meant it was a hundred little reminders every hour that the Chantry might arrest and execute her or that assassins might be on her trail. His nights were worse than usual, with the tension of the day leaving him struggling the ease the pain curling in his muscles before he fell into barely remembered night terrors.

When Leliana's agent was reporting the news from Val Royeaux, even before he could think about templars and the Lord Seeker, his mouth was framing the word "good" when they were told that she was safe. She was investigating a Red Jenny lead and then had a party to attend with the leader of the loyalist mages, after which she would return.

Now it was a hundred little reminders that she was coming back, and he had a thousand things to do before then. He pored over reports from Therinfal and anything to do with the Lord Seeker. He and Leliana argued about using some of his templars to infiltrate those at Therinfal, but ultimately they agreed that it was too risky. He was confident she would see reason, that she would agree that they needed the templars. She was a mage, but she was one who understood the dangers of magic--after all, look at the mark upon her hand.

*****

"It must be hard to them to thrive in the cold and frost."

She turned to see the commander approaching slowly, face wary. The elfroot that she had harvested weeks ago had just unfurled a single fresh green shoot today. She smiled tightly in acknowledgment before returning to shaping a small barrier against the cold for it. If not for her stupidly stripping all the mature leaves in the middle of winter, the plant would have easily survived until spring and then provided a constant slow supply of elfroot for the healers.

She had been avoiding him since they had agreed to her little compromise. He still had not seemed pleased that she was approaching the mages at all, but it made sense to her. Cassandra, Cullen and Josephine stood the best chance of getting an audience with the templars, provided they managed to wrestle enough nobles to provide them with the necessary political support. For her part, she knew the mages wanted to talk to her. No need to play games with nobles. Leliana just needed enough agents who could provide her with backup, should things go pear shaped. He had agreed reluctantly, arguing that sometimes the middle road got you exactly nowhere, which was word for word what her father liked to say. It was true that both groups may simply refuse their aid if they learned the other side was involved, but she figured that anyone who was willing to help probably could set aside their differences for long enough. Cullen, however, was tasked with keeping the peace in camp and had a hard time of it as it was.

"Just a moment. I'm in the middle of something." It needed to let water through but keep the cold out. But if it could let water through, it could also let air through and the freezing wind off the Frostbacks would kill the new shoots anyway.

He waited patiently as she swore, letting yet another barrier dissipate. What did he want anyway? She hated conflict. She had survived in the Circle by avoiding conflict at all costs. They were never going to agree on it, so he should just let the matter lie. The whole argument had frustrated her immensely. She was not convinced that the templars would be able to suppress the Breach, and he would not lend her any to test their powers on smaller rifts. Apparently they were needed to train the recruits. She conceded that he did have precious few trained men and a whole lot of people who could swing a sword about as well as she could (self-decapitation was a distinct possibility) but it then seemed like too much of a risk to pursue the templars on his word that it would work. She had argued then that the magic of the Breach was different, that when she had tried to close it, she could barely understand where to begin. It was a construct, key tethers removed and replaced to part the Veil. Even if the templars could help, they would be of no use to her without practice dampening that strange magic.

After all of that, she had no wish to speak to anyone. For the past few days, she had spent most of her time with healers and Minaeve, working on festering demon wounds. Finding limited success there, she had come out here to work on the barrier as a distraction, but her temper was fraying further with each failure.

"Can I help?" He crouched next to her, but she stood up and went to sit on the low wall. He joined her, and she could see there was no use in moving away again.

"Not really. Just trying to fix a stupid mistake I made. The one green thing in Haven, and I've killed it." She gestured vaguely at the plant.

"I see." They sat together in silence for a long minute before he broke it again. "I'm told you're departing for Redcliffe tomorrow."

"Yes. At least we'll be out of the cold for a time."

"Who is going with you?"

"Cassandra, Varric and Vivienne. I don't expect trouble, but if there is, it will be handy to have our Lady Seeker around. They don't really teach us to counter magic in the Circle. Will you be joining Josephine in Val Royeaux?"

He shrugged. "I'm not much use in the Great Game. I'm better off here where I'm needed. If they are to treat at Therinfal, I will meet them there. But that may be months away. Josephine has already started on a complicated diagram of favour trading, rumourmongering, and outright bribery. That was her attempt to explain it to me. She doesn't need that to remember what she's done and what she is to do next."

"In a different life, she would have been an excellent scholar."

"Like yourself?"

"Hardly! I read for pleasure, nothing more. Study is overrated."

"And what do you consider pleasing topics?"

"Stories. Legends. Tyrrda Bright-Axe and her leaf-eared lover. One day, I'll write something that will shamelessly plagiarise all of the best elements from every epic tale."

"You'll have to show it to me."

"Maybe. It may be more romance and adventure that anyone can handle." She had not thought that they could fall back to their usual easy back and forth after the war room. It would have been just as easy to take on the role of mage and templar again and reenact the conflict. But he had left that life for a reason.

The short winter dusk was well upon them so she called forth a bright little wisp; easy enough to do so close to the Breach. He looked strange in the green light, like a creature of legend himself with his beautiful wistful face.

He stood up with a sigh. "I must get back to work. There is much to do before you depart." He took a step towards her, and her heart raced. He did nothing but look at her, so close that she could have leaned forward and buried her face in his coat. "It feels like we are always saying goodbye." The tenderness in his voice made her heart skip a beat.

He turned on his heel sharply to leave, but stopped after a few steps. "A small squad of templars will accompany you, for as long as you have need of them. I hope you will let them aid you in sealing the rifts, and allow them to wait nearby while you treat with the mages. Travel safe, my lady. If you cannot promise caution, I will just have to find more ways to ensure your safety."

"Cullen--"

"As is my duty, my lady. I will see you in the morning before you leave?"

She pointed at him and the little wisp bobbed over, which made him smile. Her heart was in her mouth as she answered, "Yes, and again when I return. I hope to come back with good news."

"We all will pray for your success. But what is most important is that you return. Good night, Herald." The wisp followed him, bobbing excitedly.

She called after him. "Tell it to go away when you want to go to sleep!" In a softer voice, she said, "Good night, commander, and thank you." He did not seem to hear her and continued trudging back down to his men, leaving her alone in the failing light.

* * *

_This is a companion piece of sorts to Red, posted[here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3112676). I hope you enjoyed it! :)_


End file.
